Emerging wealth disparities after the storm: Evidence from Spain

Catalina Amuedo-Dorantes and Cristina Borra

Review of Economics of the Household, 2018, vol. 16, issue 4, No 11, 1119-1149

Abstract: Abstract We examine how the recession that started in December 2007 in the United States impacted wealth accumulation and inequality among Spanish households. We find that overall wealth dropped by 15 percent between 2008 and 2011, with losses concentrating among households in the mid and top wealth quintiles. The most hard hit wealth components were business assets, primary home equity, and durable assets, which declined by 40 percent, 23 percent and 19 percent, respectively. Wealth losses among all households were likely sustained by restricted access to credit. Nonetheless, in part due to their more diversified wealth portfolios, households in the top wealth quintile amassed a greater share of the country’s wealth during the recession. Consequently, wealth inequality, which receded during the expansionary years of 2002 through 2005, rose by 2008 and continued its trend in 2011.

Keywords: Recessions; Downturns; Wealth; Wealth distribution; Inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D31 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11150-017-9363-3 Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:kap:reveho:v:16:y:2018:i:4:d:10.1007_s11150-017-9363-3

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer. ... cs/journal/11150/PS2

DOI: 10.1007/s11150-017-9363-3

Access Statistics for this article

Review of Economics of the Household is currently edited by Shoshana Grossbard

More articles in Review of Economics of the Household from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().